Plants solitary or tufted, with bulbils on caudices. Leaves basal; petiole somewhat flat-tened, 2-6 cm; blade oblance-olate, 2-12 cm, thin, base cuneate to ± attenuate, margins usually 15+-toothed (teeth large, lobelike), densely long glandular-ciliate, surfaces hairy. Inflorescences 30+-flowered, very open, lax thyrses, (flowers rarely replaced by bulbils), 10-40 cm, densely tangled, purple-tipped stipitate-glandular; (bracts leaflike, gradually reduced distally). Flowers slightly bilaterally symmetric; sepals reflexed, oblong to elliptic; petals white, 3 with 2 basal yellow spots, 2 without spots, oblanceolate to spatulate, clawed, 3-4.5 mm, longer than sepals; filaments linear, flattened; pistils connate 1/2+ their lengths; ovary superior. Capsules green to yellow, sometimes purple tinged, valvate

Flowering late spring-early autumn. Wet ledges, boulderfields, and rocky slopes, usually in thin soil over rock; 500-2100 m; Ga., Ky., Md., N.C., S.C., Tenn., Va., W.Va.

Micranthes petiolaris (Rafinesque) Brouillet & Gornall is an isonym.

Stems 1-5 dm from a short, stout rhizome, also with offsets, branched above, with a large, open infl; blades of basal lvs elliptic, oblong, or lanceolate, very coarsely and saliently serrate with 4-8 teeth on each side, gradually narrowed below to a broad petiole; bracteal lvs similar but much smaller; fls irregular, the 3 larger pet 3-4 mm, clawed, the ovate blade spotted with yellow and auriculate at base, the 2 smaller pet oblanceolate, unspotted; seeds spinulose in 2 rows. Moist or wet ledges and rocky woods in the mts.; Va. to Ky., s. to Ga. June-Oct. (Hydatica petiolaris; Saxifraga leucanthemifolia Michx., not Lapeyr.)

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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